Interrogations
by Lrnd
Summary: AU. LoVe. VM in coma and the scooby gang is lost without her. I own only the plot, 99 of dialogue (you'll see the other 1) and Agent Riley. Characters owned by one lucky man. Please review. Be mean. [Complete]


Interrogations

The room was stereotypically poorly lit. One small window high on the ceiling providing what little light that the dank room could bear to have filled already to capacity with simple brown chair beside the metal table and the young man who sat on it.

"Where is she?"

"I DON'T KNOW! I wish I did."

"She was supposed to meet with you. Maybe she went. Maybe you and she fooled around. Maybe she didn't want to do more. Maybe you made her."

Logan Echolls gaped in shock.

"What? I would never do that! If you knew Veronica Mars, you'd know even if I did pull that shit, I would be kissing my ass good-bye because my dick would already be missing!"

"Maybe you already did. Maybe you are just visiting territory you marked already. You didn't like that she was dating Deputy Leo, maybe you wanted to punish her." The tone became increasingly accusatory. The cadences darker as anger and confusion swirled around the room.

"What the HELL are you talking about?"

"Veronica Mars was raped last year at a party you attended, at a party where many people claim to have seen you passing out rophynol, street name roofies, to several of your buddies."

Logan was shocked and speechless. A fine sheen of sweat beaded his forehead. His lawyer intervened.

"Agent Riley, you are disturbing my client. This line of questioning is pure speculation and is meaningless provocation. If you continue in this manner, I will advise my client to stop cooperating."

"Cooperating? Is that what you say your 'your client' is doing? What exactly did he do? I wonder." The man turned from the weak legalese thrown at him and back to Logan, viewing much as a scientist would dissecting a particularly disgusting bug. "It's very well known that you hate Veronica Mars, loathe her, in fact. It is also very well known that you mock her relentlessly in school, and actually vandalized her car with a tire iron. Who knows where that violence would have been directed if someone else hadn't stepped in, or if no one was around? What if the crime was committed last year, and you are just finishing it now?"

"Agent Riley, Sheriff, we are done." The lawyer packed up what little papers he had and forcefully grasped Logan Echolls out of his seat. The two walked to the door, Logan stopped to speak with the man holding the door, even though his lawyer tugged his arm.

"I didn't do anything. I would never hurt Veronica. I would do anything to help her." With his brown eyes intense and wet with unshed tears, Logan turned his head and walked away.

Keith Mars stood from behind the 2-way mirror and watched him go. He wanted to believe him, but he also knew Logan Echolls to be a troubled boy who had grown into a troubled young man.

Before him, the petite, blond lied curled in the fetal position on the dirty, cement floor. She was so still, but even so quiet and prone, her body impressed him as still being alive, still being vital. The floor around was stained with dark brown splotches. It was her blood. He kicked her once again. Violent and full of force, he felt his foot land solidly in her stomach. She had passed out long ago from the pain and did not even feel her body giving way under his foot. Did not feel her rib crack and break, piercing her lung. Perhaps it was a blessing that this one pain fell in the ocean of hurt and Veronica did not even twitch at such a cursory sting. He felt such deep and dark satisfaction; perhaps that is why he did not even notice when someone was behind him. However, he did feel the 2x4 hit him flat across the face, and he sure as hell noticed when the flying foot pushed his balls into his stomach. After all, Duncan Kane wasn't a soccer star for nothing. Duncan had already called the cops and alerted them to his position. It was not his fault that he in turn did not notice that the man who had been twitching on the floor moments ago had escaped, taking the wooden board with him and leaving the wooden board of a boy behind him.

He held the girl in his lap, weeping tears of frustration. She was once his before he stupidly let her go. She was once his confidant, best friend, and almost lover. For the longest time, she was the only reason that he would go to school or that he would ever begin to hang out with his goofy sister. She was the only reason why he had a few real friends instead of the many vapid leeches hanging onto his every word because he was the son of billionaire, Jake Kane. She was a sun who had brightened his world until it became eclipsed by his sister's murder and drugs to sublimate the pain and black outs. Even then, she would slip through the haze and remind him that he was a human being. It was always her gaze that made him remember who he was. And now, now that sun was dying out in his arms and he would be left with nothing but embers and ash.

"She's hurt real bad, man."

"I heard she was raped last year at Shelley Pomeroy's birthday party and the dude who did it, kidnapped her to finish the job."

"Guys, I heard the doctor say she might not make it. She's in a coma." The words were said in hushed tones, the voices soft as if at a funeral and not a chop shop where the whirrings of power tools would not let you forget that they destroyed metal bodies here, the gossip already labeling her flesh and blood as charred cinders.

The boy, for that was what he was really, held his head in his hands. Wasn't it just yesterday when she was coming out of a random guy's van? Wasn't it just yesterday when she asked him for another favor? Wasn't it just yesterday that she was perky and cynical shaking her blonde hair at him and telling him how the butler did it?

Of course it wasn't yesterday. He wished it was. It was last week. She had been missing for a week and everyone whose life she had impacted with her tornado felt her lack as strongly as they felt her presence. She was the whirlwind who blew up sand and troubles. She swept in and changed the scenery, for better or for worse.

There was a sudden clamor, guns and knifes emerged from dark hiding spots and like rats scattering at the first light, several people fleed.

"There is no need for violence. I think there has been enough of that already. All we want to do is talk."

The boy stepped out from a dark shadow in the corner. The agent would have been dead if the boy had a gun. As it was, the agent did not even twitch.

"Eli Navarro. You are wanted for questioning in the kidnapping and attempted murder of Veronica Mars." The agent hadn't been afraid he was going to be killed by Weevil although if looks could kill …

He had already known that Weevil would come quietly and he did as Weevil stood in the position to be arrested. He was cuffed and placed in the back seat of the black and white vehicle.

The hospital room was dark with only the steady beeping of the heart-monitoring machine disturbing the solitude. Logan peered in through the window in the door. She looked so small, so fragile. He had always known the tough exterior was a shell to protect her, but the shell was only an illusion. She had always worn her heart on her sleeve and now she had his on her other. He stepped in. He pondered how easy it was for him to gain entrance into her room. Fame and money can get you anything and into anywhere, even if you are the suspected rapist slash possible attempted murderer of the girl who you want to visit. He wondered if Nicole Brown had survived OJ's alleged attack on her, would he have been allowed to visit. Of course he would have been. God Bless America. Bless her capitalistic heart.

He had brought her roses in a glass vase. He placed them by her bedside and sat beside her. He clasped her hand in his and once again he wondered at its delicateness. He looked at the bandaged fingers. She had fought apparently like a tiger. Her knuckles were bandaged as well. He had heard that she had ripped her fingernails off and bloodied her knuckles trying to fight her attacker. Of course to no avail. She only projected a presence of height and strength, but she could not be more than 110 sopping wet. He kissed her palm gently, breathing in her scent, struggling not to break down and sob like he had done at the Sunset Hotel. This time he had to be the strong one.

"Hey Mars I can't believe you sleeping on the job. Aren't you supposed to be the junior detective, super sleuth here? You should be up and about trying to solve the case with your secret messages, decoder rings, and spy pens with invisible ink. Why aren't you out there? Wake up and annoy tiny blonde one! Annoy like the wind!"

His voice cracked and fell silent once more. His shoulders hunched and he held her hand in his own in a prayer.

"Please wake up. Please don't leave me. Please. Please. Please. Veronica wake up. I promise I'll be good. I won't be a jackass anymore. I won't hurt you anymore. You can even drive my car. I'll let you beat me at poker. I'll do anything. Please just don't leave me." Logan began to sob silent tears into her hand and placed his head on her bed. His shoulders shuddered with the wracking sobs. I'll watch over her, he thought. My beautiful avenging angel. I'll take care of her. Please God, I don't pray very much anymore. Please let this one stay on Earth. Please let her stay with me. He fell asleep this way, chanting her name, not knowing that he was being watched.

That a silent and ever present eye had seen everything especially the loneliness of the moment.

"Mr. Navarro. Or would you prefer to be called Weevil." His voice dripped disdain and contempt.

The boy said nothing in response

It was the same dimly lit room Logan Echolls had been questioned in, but Weevil did not know that.

"Right before she was kidnapped, several witnesses reported Veronica Mars confronting you at school. You handed her" the man stopped and quoted from the sheet, "a pink big girly pen."

Weevil looked blankly at him. No expression, no response. This was not the first time he was being questioned by the police. He had done this so many times. First when he was 12 and he had hotwired a car. Where he got sent to juvie. Then he got smart and didn't get caught. But then Lilly. _Lilly. _Lilly died and the Sheriff then, Keith Mars, had questioned him. Nothing good ever came from answering questions. Veronica never figured that out.

The truth hurts. It is not a passive thing waiting to be picked up. It has teeth and bites the hand searching vainly for it in the unrelenting darkness. That's why she was in a coma in the hospital. Found bloody and beaten the day before in a basement in the Oregon woods. Found in the arms of her ex-boyfriend Duncan Kane.

"Are you listening to me?"

Weevil spoke then.

"I don't know nothing."

"Really? Why don't I tell you something then? Veronica Mars was investigating the murder of her best friend Lilly Kane. Still nothing?" The man looked at Weevil who stared at nothing.

"She wasn't satisfied with the culprit that the Sheriff had caught. I wouldn't be either especially with how it all went down. She was accumulating very damning evidence. Especially damaging to several people's alibis. To yours specifically. Veronica Mars had found evidence that Lilly Kane was actually killed 2 hours later than previously believed, making your airtight alibi to be poked full of holes. Still nothing?" Weevil looked as if hadn't a care in the world. What a lie, he thought. The girl I loved was killed last year. This year her best friend is kidnapped and almost killed. What secrets behind Neptune High's lovely façade.

"You were Lilly Kane's stalker. Maybe your obsession went a little far. Maybe you killed her and maybe Veronica got a little too close to the truth. What did you find in the pen? What did Veronica want to know? She confronts you and then she disappears that same day? Then you are gone for a week. Don't give me that coincidence bullshit. Do you like hurting pretty blondes Did you like hitting her? Kicking her ribs in? Maybe that's how you get off. By hurting those who aren't strong enough fight back."

Finally Weevil's public defender, Cliff McCormack, stood up at this.

"Agent Riley you have no evidence of this. Are you planning on keeping my client on this circumstantial crap, because I will appeal to the judge! Yeah, I thought so." The man was a silent wall .He tossed his head at Weevil and nodded.

"We are outta here."

Weevil walked out without a look back.

Duncan Kane sat in his own hospital bed. Silent and stoic. Oh how handsome he is, the girls visiting him thought, what a hero! What bullshit. He hadn't saved her. He only got to her too late. She was dying in the room next to his and he could do nothing. She was right, like always. That is all he ever did. Sitting on the sidelines, letting things happen to him. It was pure chance that he saw her, saw the glint of the gun pointed at her when the moonlight hit it just right. He went to visit her that night. It was so easy to slip out if his room and go into hers. He saw the red roses by her bedside. Roses are for remembrance. He remembered that night he had disappeared.

Nothing was stopping him or holding him back. He had nothing. He had a cold home with an even colder family waiting for him. The former love of his life had accused him of murdering his sister. What did he have? He did not even have control of his life or memories. Tainted by drugs and death, did he even want them? No he didn't. He bought a used car, withdrew the money, and left. He didn't get very far. He went to the beach that night and sat in the sand watching the waves ebbing and flowing for all eternity. He remembered how he, Logan, Lilly, and Veronica had walked on this same beach. Happy and laughing. He didn't have many of those moments and that moment was more special to him than any. It was only a few weeks before her death. Before his life changed. He was going to change his life again and instead of waiting for it to happen, he was going to chase it. He stayed at the beach the whole night awash in memories and tears. Where he was going, no one would know who he was whether it was billionaire's son, dead girl's brother, possible murderer, no one would know. It would be a blank slate. Good bye life. Good bye Neptune. His last farewell was to his love. Good Bye Veronica Mars. He got into his car and drove south.

Before long however, he saw a familiar looking car heading in the other direction. There was a familiar face in the driver's seat. She looked scared. What was going on? Why was she driving so quickly at night? Then he saw it.

The glint of hard metal.

The wide frightened eyes.

A gloved hand.

She passed him so quickly that he didn't have time to think. He turned his car around and tried to follow the car. He cursed himself when he realized he was almost out of gas. He pulled over at a gas station and called the cops who only laughed in his face. He continued on. Trying to find the car that had left his sight and the girl who had never left his heart.

He would find them only to lose them again when he had to pull over to get gas. He never stopped and finally he was forced to stop to sleep. There was only one place the road headed to now. By that point it was too late for Veronica. While he had slept. The masked man had her where he wanted her.

Duncan had found her. He always would. He was drawn to Veronica as a moth was to a flame. She was the flame that burned so bright. She was the fire that breathed warmth into his every limb. She was dying in his arms. Duncan had found her too late.

He sat in the chair beside Veronica and held her hand. He never said a word. He looked at her and thought, if only.

The despair was written clearly on his face and so easily deciphered by the ever present watcher.

The two girls floated on rafts in the pool. The sun was shining and beating down, but gave no heat. There were no sounds of man or nature, the pool was an eerie blue and the quiet was unnatural but the two girls paid no attention and chattered along filling up the vacuum that consumed their words.

Veronica Mars. Look at you! You have all those boys dying for you.

Lilly! That is so not true!

Do you question my awesomeness? I may be dead, but I am sure as hell not blind.

Lilly was herself as always. Beautiful and young for eternity. Veronica smiled.

Am I dead too now?

Nah! It's not time for that. Goodness Grief Veronica Mars! Look at all the trouble you get into when I am not around!

Lilly! You got me into trouble all the time! Remember that time when we were 13 and you climbed up the tree to get your cat. You got stuck and told me to get you and when I did you hopped off with the stupid cat in your arms! I was stuck in that tree for TWO hours! You wouldn't get anyone to help me!

Oh it was well worth it. Remember we were waiting for Duncan to come save you! He loves that white knight shit. Even then."

Lilly we are powerful 21st century women. We can save ourselves.

Yeah I know. But boys need to feel that they can come rescue us or they would be completely helpless. They 're such babies. If women didn't exist, men would still be stuck in the caves.

I miss you Lilly.

Of course you do. There's only one of me in this world you know. No one can even come near my amazing self.

The two girls continued to float in the pool aimlessly in the unnatural world.

He sat by the girl. He turned off the camera that he had put in the smoke alarm.

"Veronica Mars. Finally we meet. Though I am sorry that we had to meet like this. Your dad sent my partner your laptop when you first disappeared. He thought it might contain information about where you might be." He laughed then. His face transformed. Suddenly he no longer looked like the intent FBI agent assigned to find the kidnapper and attempted murderer. He was a 25 year old man with a handsome face.

He looked at her and smiled at her quiet presence that even unconscious, she exuded.

"I found so much more. You are really amazing, you know. What you've survived and what you've done. I feel like I know you. It did take me a while to break your password and even then some of the files were scrambled. Excellent job at that by the way. Was it Mac who helped you do that?" He paused as if he expected an answer from the sleeping figure. "I'm sorry but I read your diary and case files. Really brilliant work! You should come work for the FBI when you get out of college. Don't worry about the money, the schools would be fools if they didn't give you a scholarship. You did the right thing putting your mother in rehab. I would love to talk with you about the case you've built. I really would like to hear who you think killed Lilly Kane. You've collected so much evidence, much of it circumstantial at points, but very incriminating. You probably are upset that I am questioning your friends, but I need to get to the truth, the heart of it all. You understand. You've done the same thing." He paused again and looked questioningly at the girl. Surprisingly she had few bruises on her face. Her face was clear and content as if dreaming peaceful dreams. He held her hand.

"I would love to talk to you. Get to know the 3-d you. But I know there is not a chance in hell of that." He grinned and looked even younger. "I know I am daring a lot, but I think I've fallen in love with you. My name is Alexander Ian Riley and I know when you wake up, you will have no idea who I am or know that you hold a chunk of my heart. But I know who you are. You are Veronica Mars and you are a survivor. You won't let the bastard who did this to you win. He stood and leaned over her. He brushed her hair out of face and kissed her forehead. He whispered into her ear, "You, Veronica Mars, are a fighter. So many people love you, you don't even know and they are all fighting for you."

He put the camera back in its hiding spot. He turned back once and pushed the doors open.

Duncan watched the man striding into his room.

"Agent Riley. I don't think my parents would want me to speak to you without a lawyer present."

"Do you really think you need a lawyer? After all, you are a hero. You come to the rescue at just the right moment or do you?" He spit out the words sarcastically.

"What are you implying?"

"Oh I think you know Mr. Kane. You disappear and Veronica disappears. You reappear at Just the right moment to save her only it's a little too late. Right before you disappeared, she accused you of killing your sister. Then she's kidnapped. A little too pat, don't you think?"

"I think you are crazy."

"Actually, if the rumors are true, you are. Maybe you attacked Veronica during one of your black outs. Did you ever think of that?"

"I loved Veronica."

"We all hurt the ones we love the most. It's the humanity in us all. Have a good night Mr. Kane."

Weevil snuck in on one of the back elevators of the hospital. No one stopped him or even saw him. Probably mistook him for help and snorted at the thought.

He found the door he was looking for and walked in.

"Yo V. Wassup? Certainly not you. What you doing sleeping while the rest of us are scampering like a chicken whose head got cut off?" He sat in the chair that Logan, Duncan, and Riley had sat in before him. He looked at this girl who had swept into his life and wondered how she had become his friend. How she had carved a corner for herself in his heart. Wondered how that had happened.

"When that junior G-man finds who did this, I will kick that jackass into next Sunday. You should be awake to see it though, don't you think? You know what Dylan Thomas said? He said, "Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light."

He wiped a tear from his eye so quickly that only a watching eye would have caught the movement. He could not stand the thought that yet another one of his friends was going to die. The prognosis was not good. "Hey V, you know if you wake up, I promise to tell you what the message was. You know you want to know. I know you want to know. So damn curious, all the damn time. Neptune High is missing you sticking your nose into its business." He laughed and no longer looked like the thug that he was.

"You know that junior G-man is trying to steal your spot as the peskiest person. He has been interrogating everyone and I mean everyone! Last I heard, he flew to Arizona to talk to that no good ex of yours Trey. He's questioned everyone under the sun who knows you. Mostly people you've pissed off and that's a shitload of people, hella lot more than you friends with. People talk you know."

Weevil shrugged in his leather jacket. "Girl, this is the longest time that you've never spoken and what a surprise, but I miss when you open your mouth and stick your foot in it." He walked to the door and was surprised to find it swing open. He looked at the boy who walked in and gave him a nod.

"Deputy Leo."

"Agent Riley."

"I just had one question." He saw the other man nod. Both turned back to Veronica. Sleeping so quietly and deeply, in others words, dead to the world. They spoke quietly as if she would wake at any moment.

"Did you love her?"

"Yes. But she didn't love me. Before you ask, I didn't hurt her." Deputy Leo laughed then. He knew that the other man would understand. "I would never hurt her. I did everything for her. Every strange request, any strange question. She was so different from the other girls I had dated. She cared. Do you know after she broke up with me she asked me to help this other girl get her dog back. This was a girl she didn't know before a rock. She still helped her. That was the kind of person she was. I was hurt that she didn't love me enough to stay with me, but I would never hurt her because of that. I could never hurt her."

Riley left leaving Leo talking to Veronica as if she could hear him wherever she was.

"Girl you should hear what people are saying about you." Wallace looked at his best friend. The girl who had cut him off the flagpole on the first day while everyone just pointed and laughed. He hadn't forgotten that his friends and admirers now were only because of his basketball talent and then his personality. Veronica was his first real friend in Neptune. He understood his mother's need to belong She was the one who made him feel as if he belonged. The one who took a look at a scrawny boy and rescued him. All she asked for in return of friendship was help to solve her cases. She never stopped thinking or talking. He looked at the sleeping figure, quiet and still. Such a contrast that it hurt him to breathe to see her like that.

"Girl how you be doin' this to a brutha." His eyes were wet with tears

"You always make liars out of the doubters. Do that now. Wake up now!" Wallace held Veronica's hand, "I always listen to you, but I guess now you have to listen to me. You always have the stories, but a week out of the loop, and I beat the lil birdy at getting the news to you. He sat in the chair and told her story after story about what was happening at school.

"Even Clemmons was asking after you! I know you are shocked to your very bones, but I think he misses you. Who can he harass now?" He continued to regale her with stories, willing with his entire being that she could hear him.

Outside the door, Keith held Alicia's hand.

"Wallace is strong. He can get through this."

"I don't think he can stand this stress. When his dad died, he was the man of the house, taking care of me even though I was the mom. He always took care of people, I think that he feels that he didn't take care of Veronica."

"Veronica always did think she could take care of herself. It isn't anyone's fault except the person who did this to her. Agent Riley will figure this out. He is a smart man. He told me he is very close to finding out who did this. If only Veronica would wake up." Alicia hugged Keith as he remembered how he felt when he heard Veronica had been found.

When she had disappeared, Keith had wasted no time in pulling on any string he had. One led to his old friend, Agent Paul Kinsey. Old PK was now a FBI chief of something or other and he recommended sending it to their internet monitoring division. There it filtered to Agent Riley who had become involved in the case. He discovered that a call had been made the day she had disappeared to the local PD who only scoffed. Of course, it was that Jackass Fuckface who had somehow gotten the call. If only Leo had picked up. Veronica wouldn't even be here.

Only a few days after that did they get a message that she had been found. He was so relieved but it was short-lived when the doctors came out of surgery. She had been badly beaten, so badly beaten that the doctors had thought she would die on the operating table.

They didn't know his Veronica though. She would surprise everyone he knew. And she did by not dying immediately even though she had been slowly bleeding her way to the end in Duncan's arms. But she was now sleeping so deeply and it was doubtful she would wake up. Would she only get one miracle? Would that be enough? What would he do without his daddy-daughter time, he did not know. He couldn't imagine his Veronica not getting up and making sure he ate right or teasing him. She would survive. She would.

He and Alicia went in and sat with Wallace. All three wishing with all their hearts and souls that she would wake up.

"Thank you Veronica. You know they are giving me a commendation for this?" He scoffed. Agent Riley had made an arrest. It was actually extremely quick work. In three weeks time he had finished interrogating everyone involved in Veronica's rape, her Lilly Kane murder investigation, and her other case files. She had surprisingly touched so many lives with her presence. The man who had hurt Veronica was in jail for her kidnapping, attempted murder, and conspiracy to domestic terrorism. He was now rotting in jail for the crimes he had committed.

"This arrest is really yours you know. All your hard work led to this. I only tied up the ends. Of course, you perhaps should have let someone know that you were going after a Unabomber, but when you wake up, your dad will probably ground you for life." He grinned.

"I was so sure that it had to be involved with what happened to you last year, then I was positive it had to do with Lilly Kane because after all that consumed you, but then we finally decoded one of your files and you surprised us all." He looked at the sleeping figure. Her hair had grown longer in the time she had slept. He had visited her every chance he got and actually got to know her friends.

"I have to go soon. I am leaving tomorrow. I have other cases to solve, other pretty girls to save. I would like to know that you were saved though, so I would really like if you woke up today." He waited hoping that the blonde would suddenly jump up and yell surprise. He looked disappointed when she did not. He still loved her and wondered if she would ever know that. He watched her for a while until a voice interrupted.

"Yo G-man, I tell her to do that everyday. I don't think she is gonna listen to some dude she don't even know." Riley turned and waved congenially to Weevil. While he had never apologized to those he interrogated, they had a pretty civil relationship. He had just been doing his job.

Logan had also walked up to him. "Yeah, Mars was never one to listen." He looked at her and his eyes filled with sorrow. He visited every day and stayed for hours. He spent hours by her side in hopes of seeing her eyes look at him once again.

They walked out of her room reluctantly. Even sleeping she held all the power.

"Hey man, I'm having a poker game tonight at my house. Duncan, Leo, and Weevil are coming. We need a fifth." Logan looked at Riley. Riley looked back and nodded.

"Sure. Sounds like fun."

Logan's pool house smelled heavily of smoke and alcohol. Riley decided to overlook the underage drinking. He understood. He was a man. Every poker game needed alcohol.

Logan threw the deck to Weevil. Weevil dealt the first hand of the night. He started laughing.

"What's so funny?" Logan asked with the cigar hanging out of his mouth.

"Every guy here, but me is in love with Veronica Mars. Actually I am not sure about junior G-Man here, but I am pretty sure."

"Don't even lie Weevil. We know 'V' holds a special spot in your heart."

They all looked at each other and started laughing.

And the poker game played on.

"So boys I guess you missed me?"

"Who us? No chance of that! Without Veronica Mars, we partied like it was 1999 every day." Logan smirked, but there was no hiding the pure joy that his eyes held when he watched her lift herself up from the bed. Weevil nodded.

"V, you only held us back."

Veronica smiled.

"No more bullshitting now boys or you won't get a hug."

"Who's gonna stop up?" Keith Mars smiled back at his daughter. Everyone piled on Veronica and hugged her. Soon visiting hours were over and everyone was forced to trickle out.

"How'd you get in here? Visiting hours was hours ago. I suppose telling time is one of those thing that you just never learned." Veronica quipped.

"I know! The hour hand, the minute hand, dude that's why we have digital." Logan laughed back at her. This was what he had missed for the time she slept. It was no fun creating barbs when she was not awake to see them.

"Aww jeez, is that all you have? I've been asleep for a month! You couldn't come up with better material than that? Maybe I should have stayed " Logan stopped her words, kissing them away. So gentle did he kiss her as if she would break in a moment. He put so much need and longing into the kiss that it amazed Veronica to speechlessness. She touched her lips surprised they could feel so much.

"You shouldn't have stayed asleep." He tried to look sternly at her. "You are never to do that again!" Veronica smiled and he bent down to kiss her again. He whispered against her lips, "I missed you. I came every day and talked to you."

"I know, I could hear you." She smiled at him. He smiled shyly back at her.

"You owe me"

"Oh really?"

"Yeah you stood me up on our first date."

"And what do you want?"

"Don't worry, you are all paid up." Veronica glanced at him suspiciously, he only grinned mischievously in response. He kissed away her suspicions and kissed her until she could barely remember her name. He held her so tightly against his body as he kissed her thoroughly. He felt as if he would never let go. "Good idea." He breathed. Veronica, held so closely heard him.

"What is?" He smirked.

"That's for me to know and you to find out, super sleuth." He kissed her objection away and laughed.


End file.
